We
would advise gentlemen and ladies who are desirous of inspecting in the
present cool but pleasant weather the ancient thoroughfares of business
in New Orleans, to take the present opportunity to look at Poydras and
Tchoupitoulas streets. In ordinary times it is as much as a lady’s
dress is worth to try to get through the crowds of eager, thorough-going
men, who in the business season run distractedly through and jostle and
tumble over the pavements.

In
the summer time the weather is too hot for the ladies to venture there,
but now they can do so with impunity both as to heat and the crowds.
What will they see? Nothing but stores, it is true, but stores where
piles upon piles of merchandise were daily brought in and carried out,
which are now almost as idle as the quays of Venice. Cross the streets
any where now, ladies, and walk leisurely, there is no danger of your
being run over; but were you here in 1860, you would have endangered
your life among the immense trains of drays, driven at headlong speed,
which perpetually crowded the roadway.

Will
we ever see Tchoupitoulas street so busy again? Perhaps so, but it may
not be soon; its memory, at least, will remain with us long; the
busiest, most energetic, most rapid of mere commercial thoroughfares
perhaps the world has seen.

•••••

The
Result.—The St. Louis Republican,
of the 28th ult., thus sums up the results to be gained by the Federal
victory at Chattanooga:

The
dispatch of Gen. Grant, in which he announces a complete victory over
Bragg, in the engagements lasting from dawn till nightfall on the 25th,
is in the usual modest vein of that officer. Reports from various
sources confirm the glad tidings fully. About fifty cannon and somewhere
in the neighborhood of six thousand prisoners have been captured,
together with minor trophies. The very strong positions of the enemy on
Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge have all been taken. Bragg has
been beaten disastrously, and must at once call Longstreet from the
siege of Knoxville, where, at last accounts, Burnside was still holding
a superior force at bay.

The
ground gained in the recent operations is considerable, particularly in
the centre, where Gen. Thomas moved. The whole of the southern part of
Missionary Ridge, from near Rossville, which is in Georgia, to the
tunnel, and, as the dispatch states, to Zummel Hill, was carried on
Wednesday. Zummel Hill is on the railroad, about eight miles below
Ringgold, and but seven from Dalton.

The
victories of Grant cannot but have a demoralizing effect upon the rebel
troops, and a discouraging effect upon the rebel civilians. We suppose
Jeff Davis will now no longer be able to resist the pressure for the
removal of Bragg, whose head must roll off in obedience to the demands
of his generals, and a disappointed community.

•••••

Gay
Cloaks.—The New York Sunday
Times says:

It
is not too much to say that the pretty peripatetics of Broadway present
a dazzling spectacle. Bright yellow cloaks with scarlet hoods, scarlet
cloaks with yellow hoods, blue cloaks with white hoods, purple cloaks
with orange hoods, striped and checkered cloaks with crimson hoods,
moving continually in prismatic procession through that great exhibition
thoroughfare, threaten with “color blindness” the man of weak vision
who ventures into their flare. It is not “a sight for sore eyes,”
but is calculated, like the glare of an Egyptian desert, to produce
ophthalmia and inflammation of the optic nerve. . .

One
would never surmise that a tremendous war was sweeping off by thousands
and tens of thousands the very flower of our population, were it not
that the splendors of this gorgeous show are blotted at short intervals
by groups and single wayfarers swathed in crape–the widowed wives and
sonless mothers, the brotherless sisters, the orphaned daughters, made
desolate by the sword.

More Prize Money.Distribution of the
Ladona’s Prize Money.

Some
days ago we printed the amount of money distributed to the officers and
crew of the Magnolia and Memphis. Those of the steamer Unadilla
have just received the following amounts:

Under
the act of Congress, approved March 2, 1863, there are three classes of
persons entitled to prize money, namely: first, persons who, at the time
of presenting their claims, are on board of United States vessels of
war; second, persons who have been discharged from the service; and
third, representatives or heirs of officers, marines, and seamen,
deceased. The Treasury Department is ordered to credit the Navy
Department with the amount held for distribution from prizes sold, and
the officers, sailors, etc., sharing in the prize money, are credited to
their accounts with the amounts to which they are respectively entitled.
With a view of saving the claimants from the piracies of claim agents,
they are to receive their respective shares through the paymasters of
the vessels to which they may be attached at the time the proceeds of
the various prizes are ready for payment by the Fourth Auditor.

Interesting
from New Orleans–
Treacherous Planters and Patriotic Women.

A
correspondent of the Mobile Register
writes from Meridian, Miss.:

“Over
ten thousand bales of cotton have been shipped to New Orleans from
Natchez and its vicinity.” Conspicuous among these traitors (for such
they are) are the names of Dr. Duncan, L. R. Marshall, Surget and
Mandeville, the latter acting as commission merchant. W. M. Shaw, from
Lake Providence, who bought nine hundred bales last spring, has shipped
four hundred to the city, which he has sold for sixty-two to sixty-five
cents. Duff Green, of Vicksburg, having taken the oath, brought down to
the city forty-seven bales, and says he considers such traffic
legitimate and intends to make all the money he can. This rich
“clique,” having been allowed to save their cotton, are thus to sell
it to our detested foe–while the poor man has his cotton burned.

What
a contrast does this make with the following extract from a letter, by a
lady in New Orleans. Truly have the ladies of New Orleans acted nobly in
this, their day of captivity.

The
town is full of Yankee men and women–speculators. Yankee soldiers,
white and black, although not so numerous as our civilians, are quite
enough so to make walking for anything but business a nuisance. You
would not recognize our once pleasant city–no opera, no parties, no
elegantly dressed ladies (Southern ones, of course, I mean) on the
street, no private carriages, no visiting; indeed, a stranger would
never take this for the Paris No. 2–the centre of refinement and
elegance. We poor mortals who are here take as much pain to dress plain
and common as was once our effort to dress well; in fact, no other style
would suit our employment of carrying clothes and food to the prisoners
at the custom house and the hospitals. This is our daily occupation, and
I think the excitement has been advantageous to us all.

This
is all Saints’ day, and the streets are alive with people going and
coming from the various cemeteries. The cars are a perfect jam. The
girls have been down early this morning to place some flowers on the
graves of our boys who have died here in the hospitals, the victims of
this cruel and horrid war. Thank God they were not neglected in their
sickness and not forgotten in death! Not a grave but had its floral
tributes, although the occupant was unknown.

_____
has just returned from the North, perfectly disgusted with the
heartlessness and extravagance there. He says you would never imagine
there was a war, or the misery with which they are surrounded. We have
enough misery in our city to make one’s heart bleed, and when the
winter sets in I don’t know what is to become of the poor that meet
you at every step.

I
have been to the cemetery where our poor boys were buried–you know we
get permission to bury them, and a plot was appropriated in Cypress
Grove No. 2, where we can place them–but only five persons are
permitted to follow them. Such a fear of demonstration in this great
Union city! It would gratify many an aching heart in eh Confederacy
could they see the graves of their loved and lost ones as I saw them
this morning–one mass of the richest and most beautiful flowers–in
the centre a cross, covered with black crape, spangled and in gold
letters: “To our Southern brothers, by the ladies of New Orleans.”
On the reverse is suspended a white wreath, between two red roses, and a
blue one over them, containing a single star. The spot was constantly
crowded, and not a small number of Yankees among them.

Exciting
News from Texas.Five
French Men-of-War Watching General Banks’ Movements.

The
correspondent of the Philadelphia Inquirer,
writing from New York under date of December 1, has the following:

A
startling piece of intelligence from Texas comes to us this afternoon,
to the effect that, on the 16th of last month, a French squadron of five
steam vessels appeared off the mouth of the Rio Grande, apparently for
the purpose of watching the movements of General Banks. The news is
communicated to the Boston Journal
by a correspondent at Brownsville. There is no reason to doubt the truth
of it, I suppose, yet one cannot help wondering why the correspondence
of other journals, written at about the same time, are silent on the
subject. True or false, however, the item is one that has created much
talk down town this afternoon. The bears interpret it as the sure
harbinger of a war with France. The steamer which arrived here from New
Orleans on Saturday last, you will remember, brought a bearer of
dispatches from General Banks. The gentleman was in such a hurry to
reach Washington, I am told, that on proceeding to Jersey City to take
the cars, and finding that the half-past seven o’clock train had just
started, he desired to make application to the President of the road to
have the train detained at Newark, so that he could overhaul it. The
President, however, could not be found, and none of the subordinates
felt warranted in taking so unusual a step. An extra train would have
been chartered if one could have been got ready. But, as it was, the
messenger had to hold over till next day, when he went on in the usual
express train. His dispatches are supposed to have had reference to the
French movement alluded to.

•••••

A
Female Strike at the Laboratory.—At the Friday noon roll
call of the female operatives at the Confederate States Laboratory, all
but fifteen or twenty refused to answer to their names, their spokesman
intimating, with a blush and a simper, that they had “struck” for
higher wages. They were receiving two dollars and forty cents per day,
and their demand was three dollars per day, which they esteemed very
moderate pay, considering the advance of food, beard and clothing.
Consequent upon the strike very little work was done on Brown’s Island
that day, and the girls had a holiday, while the authorities in charge
deliberated, in council, upon the momentous question of yielding to
their demands for an advance. Meanwhile, the little animosity engendered
between the strikers and those who had refused to join them broke out,
and displayed itself harmlessly in threats of “ducking” in the
James. The strikers were in the great majority, and their number was
increased during the day.

TUESDAYDECEMBER 8, 1863THE
BOSTON HERALD

LONGSTREET
IN FULL RETREAT.GEN. FOSTER’S CAVALRY IN PURSUIT.Details of the Rebel Repulse on
Wednesday.

Washington,
Dec. 7.–The Star has the
following:

Tazewell,
Tenn., Dec. 6.–noon. Our cavalry scouts have just returned from the
vicinity of Blair’s Cross Roads. They report a rebel column passing
all night from Knoxville to Blair’s Cross Roads. They heard the rebels
say they were going to Virginia–that the Yankees had their wounded,
but they were going to fight their way out. The Union scouts on the top
of Clinch Mountain say that large camp fires were seen last night on the
road from Blair’s Cross Roads to Rutledge. There is no longer a doubt
that Longstreet has retreated.

P.
M. There seems to be no doubt that Longstreet is in full retreat. A
deserter that came in to-day reports that he came out from Knoxville
with the rebel column on the 4th inst., the infantry and transportation
moving up the valley on the other side of the Houlston river and the
cavalry on this side to cover an attack from the Union troops in this
vicinity. The talk among the rebel soldiers was that they were going to
Virginia or North Carolina.

General
Foster’s cavalry division was four miles this side of Maynardville at
2 p.m.,
when the courier left, preparing to attack the enemy’s cavalry.

9
P.M. After the repulse of the enemy’s cavalry at Clinch River on the
2d inst., their whole force continued to hover around, endeavoring to
turn our flanks and to force some of the fords. In all these efforts
they were foiled and driven back in several small encounters. In
addition we succeeded in blockading a portion of the valley road near
Rutledge, in the rear of Ransom’s column. Yesterday the whole rebel
cavalry withdrew in the direction of Knoxville. Graham’s brigade
followed for a short distance.

It
is reported that the roads in front are blockaded and that the rebels
have burnt the railroad bridges at Strawberry Plains and Mosey Creek. If
this be so, it indicates that Longstreet is or soon will be retreating.

•••••

THE
DEPARTMENT OF THE GULF.[From Our Regular
Correspondent.]

New
Orleans, Thursday, Nov. 26, 1863.–The arrival of Gen. Banks on
the coast of Texas is said to have been a perfect surprise. All
available rebel forces had been withdrawn and concentrated to oppose the
advance by way of the Teche. In evacuating Brownsville, the rebels fired
the U. S. barracks, and the flames communicated to a portion of the
town. As soon as practicable our forces moved on Corpus Christi, about
140 miles from Brownsville, which we occupied without resistance. On the
17th they surprised the garrison at Aransas Pass, and after a short
affair, in which Brig. Gen. Ransom displayed great tact and skill, and
in which the Maine 13th and 15th played a distinguished part, the place
was surrendered with 13 officers and 90 men, 4 guns, a schooner, and a
quantity of arms, ammunition and transportation.

On
the 23d inst., Gen. A. L. Lee, Chief of Cavalry in this Department, sent
out a detachment which surprised a camp of rebels about 20 miles from
New Iberia, La., and captured 6 officers and 35 men, and a large number
of horses and arms, belonging to Major Du Pierre’s Battalion of the
1st La. Mounted Zouaves.->

The
Southern guerrillas have resumed their infernal attacks upon the
Mississippi steamboats. Between the liability of these steamers to get
burned to the water’s edge through the agency of rebel incendiaries,
and the danger of being destroyed by rebel batteries along the shores,
the navigation of the Mississippi is not a little precarious, and a very
uninviting enterprise in a business point of view. There are a few
gunboats stationed along the river at long intervals, and an occasional
patrol by others, but these precautions prove altogether inadequate to
the present emergency on the lower Mississippi.

There
must either be a larger and more effective patrol fleet, or the boats
must be attended by a safe convoy. A large fleet of gunboats are now
lying idle at this port, and has been for several weeks. Why are not a
portion of them sent up the river to protect our commerce, without which
Vicksburg and Port Hudson might as well not have been taken. The last
boat attacked was the Black Hawk, near the mouth of the Red River. The boat was fired by
means of a shot upsetting the stove, and very narrowly escaped burning,
the pilot house and several staterooms being consumed. Seven 6 and
12-pounders, together with musketry, played into the steamer from every
angle, but fortunately the gunboat Choctaw,
hearing the firing, came to her relief at a timely moment, dispersed the
rebels, and towed the steamer back to the gunboat station, where her
injuries were repaired, and a temporary steering apparatus furnished,
and which, accompanied by the steamer Welcome,
also fired into, she continued to New Orleans under escort. The personal
injuries done on board the Black Hawk were as follows: The cabin boy,
hidden under a berth, had his head taken off; a Federal deserter was
also killed; Samuel Fulton, a brother of the captain, and one of the
boat’s officers, had his leg taken off, but is doing well. The
barkeeper, James Ferguson, was wounded in the face by a splinter. The
officers and cabin boys lost all their clothing by the burning of the
Texas [deck].1
The steamer Brazil, Capt.
Crane, which arrived here to-day, received forty shots near Bayou Sara.

Lieut.
John Bauer and Sergt. Carl Fischer, of the Rhode Island 2d Cavalry, were
convicted on the 27th before Judge Atocha, of extorting valuable watches
and jewelry from a planter near Franklin, last spring, during the first
Federal occupation of the Teche country. The former was sentenced to one
year at hard labor, with ball and chain, on Ship Island, and the latter
to six months hard labor at the same insular retreat.

November
27th.–The National Thanksgiving was quite generally observed by the
Northerners in New Orleans, although the attendance at the churches was
rather meagre. Not so at the theatre in the evening, where Dan Setchell
and his associates played “Rosedale” to an immense audience. The
traditional turkey was served at many a board, and thoughts of the
absent and the past mingled pensively with the pleasures of the hour.
Your correspondent was fortunate enough to be the guest of Paymaster
Beaman, late of Boston, on board the supply steamer Union,
where a Northern turkey, Northern oysters, and Cape Cod cranberries
graced the occasion.

WEDNESDAYDECEMBER 9, 1863MASSACHUSETTS
WEEKLY SPY

Gen.
Meade’s Campaign.

The
campaign of the Army of the Potomac is over for the present–probably
for the winter. It is hard to believe that the troops who set out last
week so full of exultation could return so soon to their old encampments
with nothing accomplished. So far as can now be seen the campaign is
barren of results, and presents a contrast to the great promises with
which it was begun, by no means agreeable to think about. The army is
now encamped in its old quarters near Brandy Station, on the line of the
Orange and Alexandria railroad–having lost about six hundred men,
mostly wounded and missing, during eh week’s campaign. The retreat was
advised by a council of war, who, seeing the enemy had chosen his
position and entrenched himself in it, thought it too hazardous to risk
a battle. This difficult does not seem to have been taken seriously into
the account till our army’s ten days’ rations were nearly exhausted,
and the cold weather came to increase the perils of an offensive
campaign. Under the circumstances Gen. Meade acted the part of a humane,
if not a great and successful general. Whatever blame is to be awarded
does not belong to the act of retreating, but to the poor strategy which
allowed the enemy to fortify himself in a position of his own choosing,
till retreat was the only way of escape from impending disaster. The
result, however, is not worthy of very serious disappointment. It is
simply a failure to obtain a victory for which the country began to hope
too soon. Now the army of the Potomac will probably wait till it is
strengthened by fresh troops, and then by such a movement upon the
communications of the rebels as that of which the army of the west have
given brave examples, make an easy end of the rebellion in Virginia.

•••••

Rumors
of Change.

New
York, Nov. 3.—A special Washington dispatch to the Evening
Post says it is rumored that Gen. Meade will be removed from the
army of the Potomac, and the new commander will lead the army in a
December campaign.

•••••

Items.

Five
million two hundred thousand dollars in prize money has been adjudicated
since the war began.

The
rebel guerrillas have killed and carried off more than 5000 hogs on the
Kansas border.

The
Japanese are making it very unpleasant for foreigners in Kanagawa. They
murdered a French officer, and are acting like devils generally. An
armed force from the fleet guards the city, and there were twenty-two
war vessels in the harbor.

It
is estimated that 60,000 to 70,000 Irish emigrants have reached this
country, from Cork alone, during the past year, and this is but a small
portion of the immense emigration that is going on.

The
surplus of the Russian ball fund in New York, amounting to $3000, will
be divided between the United States Sanitary Commission and the Society
for Ameliorating the Condition of the Poor.

It
is decided! The Empress Eugenie, mistress of the robes to Christendom,
has put her foot down and decreed the abolition of hoops, and from her
dictum there is no appeal.

A
serious disturbance broke out, Dec. 4, at Amboy, N. J. Five hundred
railroad employees have struck, and have stopped one thousand tons of
government freight consisting of cannon, arms, stores, &c., &c.
The military were called out to restore order.

Troubled
Mexico.—The last
advices from Mexico indicate a growing spirit of discontent among those
who have heretofore acquiesced in the French farce. A squad of men
offering the Mexican crown to an Austrian prince, whose name was unknown
to one in a hundred thousand throughout the country, is not regarded as
a popular thing at all. And the church party are further discontented,
on account of the little respect paid by the French soldiery to church
property. They have appropriated the rare paintings and diamond eyes of
the images, and used the church for a stable–a stable government not
much to the mind of the church party which helped the invaders, and has
long been a curse to the nation. If this spirit of opposition should
grow into a revolution in favor of President Juarez, the best and most
enlightened head the nation has had for years, it will be a good result
for this unsettled country. Several priests throughout the republic have
seceded from the church of Rome, intending to act hereafter with the
Greek Catholic church of Constantinople.

•••••

Military
Etiquette.—Lieut.
W., of the 3d R. I. heavy artillery, at one of the posts in the
department of the south, while on duty in a carriage, had the kindness
to favor a staff officer with a ride. On meeting a private of a colored
regiment, who paid the required salute, which was properly returned by
the lieutenant, the following dialogue, in substance, ensued:

Staff
Officer–“Do you salute Negroes?”

Lieutenant–“He
is a soldier, and he saluted me.”

Staff
Officer–“I swear I won’t salute a Negro.”

Lieutenant–“The
regulations require you to return a salute.”

Staff
Officer–“Curse such regulations; I’ll never salute a Negro, and I
don’t think much of a man who will.”

Lieutenant–(Coolly
reigning in his horse.) “You can get out and walk, sir.”

The
official was consigned to shoe leather and the sand, with the
reflection, we could hope, that he was less of a man than the Negro.–Providence
Journal, 4th.

•••••

Philadelphia,
Dec. 4.—The Bulletin
publishes the following: We learn this afternoon from an agent of a
steamship company that he has been endeavoring to-day to purchase 1000
tons of coal, but thus far unsuccessfully. He has received information
that a meeting of coal operatives was held last evening, at which it was
resolved, in order to keep up the present high prices, to suspend
operations. The suspension was to commence immediately, but it was
finally determined it should not commence until the 11th of December.

•••••

Maryland.—The
city of Baltimore has just enjoyed the luxury of a draft–the loyal and
half-loyal, slaves, and their masters, being affectionately sandwiched
together. The secessionists who were drafted pay their three hundred
dollars with alacrity. With equal alacrity the slaves enter into the
service of the country. The Methodists there are holding old-fashioned
abolition meetings, such as their fathers used to hold in the colonial
days. Secessionist women, too, are finding Jordan a hard road to travel,
many of whom General Schenck has persuaded to try the benefit of
southern travel before winter closes in.

THURSDAYDECEMBER 10,
1863THE
PITTSFIELD SUN (MA)

Women’s
Labor.

The
New York papers have been much exercised lately over the Women’s Labor
question, involving as it does the strike of the seamstresses,
hoop-skirts women, umbrella girls, &c., &c., and the diversity
of opinion and suggestion elicited is somewhat amusing. How many times
Hood’s Song of the Shirt has
been quoted would require a lightning calculator to determine;2
but one thing is certain, viz: the decided sympathy for the girls and
the prevailing hope that some benefit to them may be the result of so
much publicity. We observe, however, that a well-known and fashionable
modiste has entered the arena of discussion, and she pretty sharply
takes up the question of higher wages and the claims to employment
presented by the thousands of indigent young women found in such a large
city as New York. One would fancy that Madame Demorest3
could fairly comprehend the subject of finding employment for the needy
and the justice of the female strikes, but whether she may not be
somewhat biased is an open question. The arcana of mantua making and
bonnet trimming are dangerous for even the boldest editor to seek to
penetrate. There is something awful also in the mystery of tucks, Smyrna
edging, frills, scallops, trimmings, curtains, &c., &c., as
every husband will testify, and the complete inability of the masculine
mind to appreciate the importance of a lore of a bonnet as an article of
commerce, much more as an article of manufacture, renders him liable to
admit everything as fact without presuming to enter into any argument
concerning this phase of women’s rights. Madame Demorest says she is
willing to bear the odium of apparent opposition to her sex if she can
only awaken in them a spirit of emulation to acquire skill and
efficiency in any situation they assume to fill, and thus elevate and
dignify all useful employments. She then proceeds to expose the foolish
pride of many work-girls, their care when soliciting employment to make
it known that “they have never done anything”–a remark seldom made
with any apparent regret–the practise peculiar to many of carrying to
and from their shops a roll of music or a book or two to indicate going
to school, taking or giving music lessons; in short, the false vanity
which seems to actuate a large proposition of them. Finally Madame
Demorest urges the work-girls to determine to be worth more than they
receive as the only just claim to higher remuneration. In this view, and
this only, she says, “the laborer is worthy of his hire.” The rustle
of the modiste’s skirts hardly subsides before a bluff old bachelor
correspondent ventures a hint to unemployed needlewomen, viz: to open a
Mending Establishment to meet his own and other unhappy cases. He
describes his wardrobe as shirts in rags for want of a stitch in time,
hose open-mouthed, night shirts with no buttons, drawers stringless,
pocket-handkerchiefs hem-less, and exhibiting a variety of dilapidations
as melancholy as it is universal. ->

A
Mending Shop this bachelor believes would be a fortune to competent
working-women. But more practicable than either another respondent suggests
a different occupation as a relief to the seamstresses. Every young girl
without education enough to be a teacher, who is compelled to earn her own
bread, turns seamstresses, and the natural result is that there are too many
seamstresses. A vast
number of them would, however, be healthier, better clothed, fed and lodged,
and paid by becoming cooks and housemaids. Employment of this kind there is
no difficulty in obtaining. No doubt there is a certain loss of independence
involved in accepting it, and a certain amount of discomfort involved in
living in another person’s house; but the question is not one of
independence or dignity, but of food and clothing. It is of the difficulty
ofgetting petticoats and good
dinners that the working-women complain; and he submits with all deference,
that it is only after these have been provided that they can fairly ask the
public to sympathize with their want of social position. If all the farm
boys in the country were to insist on coming to the large cities, turning
dry goods clerks, and finding themselves unable to obtain employment, or
only at miserable wages, should refuse to go back to their farms, because
farm work was dirty, he doubts if they would meet with much commiseration.
And if women will insist on starving as seamstresses, when they can grow fat
and save money as chambermaids, he really doesn’t see who is to blame but
themselves. A decidedly sensible view.–Boston
Post.

•••••

The
art of photography is likely to play an important part in future works of
foreign travel. All travellers ought to know how to sketch, but not many do;
and what, after all, is a sketch to a photograph? The former may represent a landscape, a ruin, a celebrated personage, with
tolerable accuracy; but the latter must,
for does not the object in question sit to the sun, the truest of all
artists? We are not surprised, therefore, to learn that Mr. du Chailin, who
has lately returned to Africa, has taken with him a set of photographic
instruments and chemicals, having previously prepared himself for their use
by learning the art of photography. With a series of cartes
de visite of his future gorilla acquaintances he may be able to overcome
the incredulous attacks of Dr. Gray, and other of his English enemies, who
may be expected to pounce upon him at his return. Another African traveller,
M. Jules Gerard, the lion-killer, who left England in the spring on an
exploring expedition, in the endeavor to find a route from the west coast of
Africa through Timbuctoo to Algiers, was similarly equipped as an amateur
photographer. We shall look for their “sun-pictures” of Africa with
interest.

FRIDAYDECEMBER 11,
1863THE
CALEDONIAN (VT)

Mr. Lincoln’s Daily Life.

“Perley,”
the Washington correspondent of the Boston Journal,
writes as follows of the daily life of President Lincoln:

Mr.
Lincoln is an early riser, and he is thus able to devote two or three
hours each morning to his voluminous private correspondence, besides
glancing at a city paper. At nine he breakfasts–then walks over to the
War Office to read such war telegrams as they give him (occasionally
some are withheld) and to have a chat with Gen. Halleck on the military
situation, in which he takes great interest. Returning to the White
House, he gets through with his morning’s mail, in company with a
private secretary. Some letters are endorsed and sent to the
Departments–others are entrusted to the Secretary, who makes a minute
of the reply which he is to make–and others the President retains,
that he may answer them himself. Every letter receives attention, and
all which are entitled to a reply receive one, no matter how they are
worded, or how inelegant the chirography may be.

Tuesdays
and Fridays are Cabinet days, but on other days visitors at the White
House are requested to wait in the ante-chamber, and send in their
cards. Sometimes, before the President has finished reading his mail,
Louis will have a handful of pasteboard, and from the cards laid before
him Mr. Lincoln has visitors ushered in, giving precedence to
acquaintances. Three of four hours do they pour in, in rapid succession,
nine out of ten asking offices, and patiently does the President listen
to their applications. Care and anxiety have furrowed his rather homely
features, yet occasionally he is “reminded of an anecdote,” and
good-humored glances beam from his clear, grey eyes, while his ringing
laughter shows that he is not “used up” yet. The simple and natural
manner in which he delivers his thoughts makes him appear to those
visiting him like an earnest, affectionate friend. He makes little
parade of his legal science, and rarely indulges in speculative
propositions, but states his ideas in plain Anglo-Saxon, illuminated by
many lively images and pleasing allusions, which seem to flow as if in
obedience to a resistless impulse of his nature. Some newspaper admirer
attempts to deny that the President tells stories. Why, it is rarely
that any one in his company for fifteen minutes without hearing a good
tale, appropriate to the subject talked about. Many a metaphysical
argument does he demolish by simply telling an anecdote, which exactly
overturns the verbal structure.

About
4 o’clock the President declines seeing any more company, and often
accompanies his wife in her carriage to take a drive. He is fond of
horseback exercise, and when passing the summer at the Soldiers’ Home
used generally to go to and fro in the saddle.

The
president dines at 9, and it is rare that some personal friends do not
grace the round dining-table, where he throws off the cares of office,
and reminds those who have been in Kentucky of the old school gentleman
who used to dispense generous hospitality there. From the dinner-table,
where coffee is served, and where the President passes the evening,
unless some dignitary has a special interview. Such, I am informed, is
the almost unvarying daily life of Abraham Lincoln, whose administration
will rank next in importance to that of Washington in our national
annals.

The
President’s wife ought not to be left unmentioned, although there is
little of interest to chronicle in the daily round of serving, reading
and visiting hospitals which occupies the time of Mrs. Lincoln. She may
have made mistakes–who does not?–in her invitations, and thereby
provoked envious criticisms. Neither do those of the Democratic era
admit that there can be any courtesy displayed here now-a-days. But I am
sure that since the time that Mrs. Madison presided at the White House,
it has not been graced by a lady so well fitted by nature and by
education to dispense its hospitalities as is Mrs. Lincoln. Her
hospitality is only equaled by her charity, and her graceful deportment
by her goodness of heart.

Disaster on the Hudson.Loss of the Isaac Newton.

On
Saturday evening at 7 o’clock, the splendid steamer Isaac Newton, while on her way to Albany, caught fire near Fort
Washington, from the bursting of a flue, and was burned to the water’s
edge. She is a total wreck. The details of the disaster are
substantially as follows: As soon as the explosions took place, one of
the pilots anchored the boat near the shore. In a few minutes thereafter
it was discovered that the vessel was on fire amidships, but all
attempts to extinguish the flames proved unavailing. It was impossible,
owing to the dense smoke and steam on the lower deck, to get at the
hose, and the heat drove the engineer from his post. Fortunately, a tug
and propeller hastened to the relief of the passengers, offices, and
crew, who were speedily transferred from the burning wreck to a place of
safety.

Fourteen
persons, badly scalded, were taken from the vessel, six of whom died
during the night and yesterday.

At
the time of the accident, the passengers had been driven into the cabins
by the cold. The signal of distress given by the captain soon brought
assistance, but the scene presented as the vessels approached the
burning boat was one which will not fade from their memory during the
lifetime of those who witnessed it.

The
darkness of the night–the fire issuing from all parts of the vast
five-decked vessel–the reflection of the flames on the sky and on the
water–the people hurrying from the hills, moving like shadows in the
dreadful firelight–he struggle to get on board the craft that came to
relieve the sufferers–the quick, yet tender, handling of the burned
and scalded and suffocated firemen who were snatched like brands from
the burning–the column of flame that blazed up, lighting those who
escaped and their deliverers to the opposite shore–the final sinking
of the wreck, and the darkness that shrouded all, formapicture that needs none of the coloring of fancy to make it vivid
and startling.

•••••

A Hard Case.

Private
Alvah H. Miles, Co. F, 2d Vermont regiment, detailed for duty on the
gunboat flotilla, Mississippi River, and who deserted March 15, 1862,
has been sentenced to be branded with the letter D on the palm of his
right hand. This unfortunate man claims a slight consideration, for his
manly testimony before the court evinced him to be a man of honor and
spirit. He was ordered to report as above, with a number of soldiers,
and on their way thither they became intoxicated to a beastly degree,
which was more than the honorable soldier could endure, so he deserted
them and enlisted elsewhere. When the specification and charges were
read to him, he bravely pleaded guilty, and explained to the court the
trying situation in which he was placed by the dishonorable conduct of
his companions in arms. “I am in your hands, gentlemen, and at your
mercy. If I am restored to the ranks, I shall faithfully perform my
duties as a soldier, and endeavor to retrieve the error I have
committed. If I am sentenced to be shot, I’ll stand and meet my fate
as a man.” These as near as I can remember, are the exact words of the
condemned soldier, who, to shun one evil, unwittingly committed a
greater.

SATURDAYDECEMBER 12, 1863PORTLAND
DAILY ADVERTISER (ME)

English Artillery.–The English, in view of
European complications, are striving very hard to keep pace with other
nations in the matter of effective artillery; but by their own
confessions they are far behind. The London Times
has an article on the subject in which it says their best gun yet is the
old 68-pounder, and they can only indent 4½ inch iron. That would be
nothing on this side, for that thickness could be easily honeycombed by
the better classes of both federal and rebel cannon. The Times
says the famous German maker Krupp has supplied Russia with a large
number of funs that will easily pierce the thickness of the iron on
their (English) ironclads. France, too, is vastly ahead in the
effectiveness of their rifled cannon. There is another new feature in
artillery experiments which we have never before seen discussed, and
that relates to throwing shot under the water, and even firing submerged
cannon. When we consider the incompressible density of the water, and
that it will flatten or break a conical shot which may strike it at
right angles, we are hardly ready to believe that much can be done in
this way; but there is hardly any limit to human ingenuity, when, as
now, it is all devoted to the heroic science of human slaughter.

The
ironclads, of course, are not plated under the water line any further
than to protect what may be exposed of the hull below the load line by
careening. A vessel so clad to the keel might sink by her own weight, if
her sub-marine parts were equal in specific gravity to the portions out
of the water. Now, how to get shot into this vulnerable part–this heel
of the iron Hercules–is the question.4
The Times says Mr. Whitworth
has invented a flat-headed shot which holds its path straight into the
water, instead of rebounding. And after having thus penetrated twenty
feet of water obliquely, and reached a depth of three feet, it will
prove effective, and has in fact penetrated a thickness of eight inches
of oak timber.

Again:
The Times says that more
startling developments have been produced by guns which were themselves
submerged, and fired when under water at a sub-marine target. For this
purpose an Armstrong 110-pounder was faced at a target at 25 feet
distance. When the tide had risen to as to cover the gun to a depth of
six feet, it was fired. Out of some dozen experiments there were few
failures, and the effect on the target was most extraordinary. The shot
passed through 13½ inch piles, having 5-inch oak planks bolted in front
of them, or a thickness of eighteen inches of solid timber. An old
vessel, the Griper, was next
moored at a similar distance, and the gun pointed at a place where her
side made an angle of 42 degrees with the line of fire. The solid shot
went through both her sides; a shell penetrated one side and burst
inside.

These
statements are rather staggering to one skilled in hydraulics, and we
rather hold to the theory that if one places the muzzle of his gun under
water, and fires it, the effect will be to burst the gun. But if these
missiles can be got to operate under the water, it would seem that the
nicety of the process must be such as to render practical use out of the
question. The resistance of the water to a submerged ball or shell would
be such as to require the most perfect shape in the missile to give any
certainty to its directness. The proportion of divergence from any
slight imperfectness in shape would be as much greater in water than
air, as water is more ponderable than air. Since the wooden walls of
England no longer serve for purposes of defence, England has been
rushing from one thing to another without advancing much; and this when
a general European war is imminent.

Jeff.
Davis’ Message.

Fortress
Monroe, Dec. 11.–The message of Jefferson Davis to the
Confederate Congress was sent in on the 7th inst.

He
is very despondent over the losses of the strongholds of Vicksburg, Port
Hudson, and many other points. He says there has been no improvement in
the relations of the Confederacy with foreign countries since his
message last January; on the contrary, there is greater divergence in
the conduct of European nations, assuming a character positively
unfriendly, and adds:

“The
marked partiality of Great Britain in favor of our enemies [is] strongly
evinced in their decisions regarding the blockade, as well as their
marked difference of conduct on the subject of the purchase of supplies
by the two belligerents. This difference has been conspicuous since the
commencement of the war.”

Of
the Confederate finances he says:

“The
public finances demand the strictest and most earnest attention. A
prompt and efficacious remedy for the present condition of the currency
is necessary to a successful performance of the operations of the
Government.” He recommends taxation instead of further sales of bonds
or issues of treasury notes, adding: “The holders of the currency now
outstanding can only be protected by substituting for it some other
security.”

•••••

A
veteran officer of the regular army writes as follows to the Army and Navy Journal:

“At
Gettysburg, on the first three days of July, the regulars, out of 2044
men, lost 1000, by far the heaviest loss, proportionately, suffered by
any body of men in that field. And yet, while every State whose
volunteers were engaged, is to have a plot for its illustrious dead,
these brave fellows of our old regular army, many of whom had served for
twenty years, and who finally met their death in the van, are to be
buried with the unknown–thrown
into a corner ditch because they fought but voted not–put on a level
with the horses that fell with them, because their officers were
soldiers, not politicians.”

This
injustice toward the brave regulars should be promptly remedied; and we
concur entirely with the suggestion of the Army
and Navy Journal, that an honorable and suitable position for their
burial would be at the base of the proposed monument, or the inside,
fronting the tier of State burial lots.

•••••

Gen. Grant.–If Gen. Halleck does not look
to his laurels, says a Washington correspondent, Gen. Grant will be
promoted over him, to the rank of Lieutenant General. A commander who
can show as his trophies four hundred and seventy-four cannon, and
ninety thousand prisoners, merits all the honors a grateful Republic can
bestow upon him.

1The
Texas deck is the one directly below the pilot house, thus named because
the largest cabin (that of the captain) is located there, and, at this
time, Texas was the largest state.

2Full
text of Hood’s poem is available at www.victorianweb.org/authors/hood/shirt.html.
The work refers to the exploitation of home workers in early nineteenth
century England, and was part of a larger movement toward social
reforms.

3Ellen
Louise Curtis Demorest is credited with the invention of the mass
produced paper pattern for clothing. (Source).